"I'm still a little scared, if that's what you mean."
Hardy sighed. "That's what I mean."
"You can't protect me against my feelings, Daddy."
"I know," Hardy said. "And that just breaks my heart." He wondered anew whether he could protect her from anything at all, and a fresh wave of anger swept over him. All the words in the world to the contrary, he suddenly knew he would kill without mercy if anyone harmed his girl. And maybe it wouldn't hurt her to have some intimation of that, in spite of what he'd just told her to the contrary. "You know how I said I wouldn't do anything if something happened to you?"
"Yes."
"Well, if I could stop it before it could get to you, if it got to that…" He didn't finish. "I'm speaking hypothetically, now, Beck. But there's absolutely no way I'd let anybody hurt you."
Her tentative question nearly brought him to tears. "So what are we going to do?"
"I'm not completely sure yet, hon. But your mother and I, we're going to take care of you, no matter what. Maybe," he said, "if I can get myself to abandon John Holiday…"
"But you can't do that. He's your friend."
"Right." Out of the mouths of babes, Hardy thought. "I know. But maybe I can make them think I stopped." He stopped himself again. He was about to say, "Then set some kind of trap for them." "But look," he did say, "let's believe for a minute there's a really pretty decent chance that in a day or two they'll have these people in jail."
"And then they won't be after us?"
"No." He chucked her gently under her chin. "But they're probably already not after you now, not really."
She looked up at him hopefully. "Promise?"
Hardy hesitated. They had a rule about a promise being a promise, sacred and unbreakable. "I really don't think so," he finally said.
He felt a small shudder pass through her. "That's not a promise."
"No, I know," he said. "But close."